Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- 1 Introduction: Money and the morality of exchange
- 2 Misconceiving the grain heap: a critique of the concept of the Indian jajmani system
- 3 On the moral perils of exchange
- 4 Money, men and women
- 5 Cooking money: gender and the symbolic transformation of means of exchange in a Malay fishing community
- 6 Drinking cash: the purification of money through ceremonial exchange in Fiji
- 7 The symbolism of money in Imerina
- 8 Resistance to the present by the past: mediums and money in Zimbabwe
- 9 Precious metals in the Andean moral economy
- 10 The earth and the state: the sources and meanings of money in Northern Potosí, Bolivia
- Index
8 - Resistance to the present by the past: mediums and money in Zimbabwe
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 February 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- 1 Introduction: Money and the morality of exchange
- 2 Misconceiving the grain heap: a critique of the concept of the Indian jajmani system
- 3 On the moral perils of exchange
- 4 Money, men and women
- 5 Cooking money: gender and the symbolic transformation of means of exchange in a Malay fishing community
- 6 Drinking cash: the purification of money through ceremonial exchange in Fiji
- 7 The symbolism of money in Imerina
- 8 Resistance to the present by the past: mediums and money in Zimbabwe
- 9 Precious metals in the Andean moral economy
- 10 The earth and the state: the sources and meanings of money in Northern Potosí, Bolivia
- Index
Summary
The most characteristic form of religious experience among the Shona people of Zimbabwe is spirit possession. A variety of forms of possession exist. The most important and the most widely described is possession by the spirits of the chiefs of the past. These spirits, known as mhondoro or lion spirits, have featured in a number of books and articles and they are the leading figures of this chapter as well.
One reason for the notoriety of the mhondoro is the part played by their mediums in organising resistance to the Rhodesian state. Many mhondoro mediums took a key role in the rebellion that broke out in the years immediately following the arrival of the British pioneer column in 1890. A large number were active on the side of the nationalist guerrillas during the civil war between 1972 and 1979 culminating in the achievement of majority rule in 1980. In another publication I have analysed and assessed the contribution to this achievement made by recent mediums in an area known as Dande (Lan 1985). In this chapter I describe an aspect of the rebellious nature of these mediums which is especially puzzling and intriguing.
This relates to the ritual practice of the mediums as it was in the years before Independence. By means of a set of ritual prohibitions, mediums expressed their belief that certain commercially produced commodities available on the open market were extremely dangerous to them.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Money and the Morality of Exchange , pp. 191 - 208Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1989
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